Minutes of the
WARGAVE THEATRE WORKSHOP AGM
held on Monday 15 May 2023 at 7.30pm
Green Room, Woodclyffe Hostel, Wargrave
Present:
Chez Annetts, Ian Bacon, Sara Beazley, Corinne Cockrell, Linda Daman, Clive Dow, Sylvia Ewan, Hilda Freeman, Patricia Frost, Tony Gordon, Joy Haynes, Joe Haynes, Emmajane Hughes, Michael Jamieson, Martin Lorenz, Jenny Manning, Henry Marchant, Rod Murray, Ann Pearce, Celia Reinbolt, Ann Roberts, Len Roberts, Dave Robinson, Graham Wheal
Apologies:
Simon Calverley, Peter Hughes, Karen Lloyd, Eilish MacBean, Alex Schatunowski, Lloyd Scrivener, Paula Watt, Mike Watt, David Williams
Minutes of the AGM:
The Minutes of the 2022 AGM were proposed for acceptance by Ann Roberts and seconded by Ann Pearce.
Treasurers report (Michael Jamieson)
John Turner approved and audited the accounts for year ending 28 February 2023 and has been invited to examine next year’s accounts. Michael Jamieson proposed and seconded by Rod Murray.
The Society’s accounts for the twelve months ended 28 February 2023 show a small surplus of £341. Despite this being both the first year free of all Covid restrictions and a Festival year, the surplus is £1,530 lower than that reported last year. This is due to higher fixed costs and overheads and the end of reduced rental costs charged during the pandemic.
Profit from productions was £1,289 higher than last year due mainly to the success of the Pantomime (Pied Piper) which completely sold out and generated £7,843 being £1,699 more than the 2022 Pantomime, Camelot. Profit from Shakespeare was offset by lower income from the Autumn production due to the postponement of “Laying the Ghost” as explained in the Committee’s report. The short notice replacement Little Grimley/Hey Santa nonetheless raised a creditable £977.
The Festival Shakespeare production of The Tempest generated a surplus of £4,038 which was c. £1,000 lower than the previous Shakespeare production in 2019 (As You Like It). This was due to lower income from ticket sales reflecting the decision to reduce the volume of covered seating together with a higher share of profits required to be contributed to the festival committee (from 20% to 30%). The Youth Theatre also contributed ££854 from their festival production of 40 minute As You Like It.
Fixed costs and overheads totalled £16,778 were £1,507 higher than last year. This is due mainly to the higher costs of set storage following the move from Sheeplands Farm to the Tractor Shed at Highfield Farm on which Wokingham District Council have now levied a charge for business rates! In addition, the rental of the Green Room and Wardrobe has reverted to pre-Covid levels. It should be stressed however, that we were faced with significant cost increases from our old, and frankly inadequate, set storage arrangement at Sheeplands and thus a net increase in this cost line was inevitable.
In an era of spiralling energy costs, the Society was fortunate to receive a credit from SSE in respect of the Woodclyffe Hostel due to over estimation of electricity usage that had built up in previous years. The current electricity contract with SSE expires later this year. On renewal, this will result in a significant increase in energy charges to the Society in 2023-4.
Looking ahead, the Society is facing significant cost pressures. Given the high fixed cost base, it is critical that, in addition to the Pantomime, Wargrave Theatre puts on a minimum of two adult productions each year.
As response to the cost challenge, whilst the ticket prices for the Pantomime were held flat in January 2023, ticket and bar prices were increased for the Spring production of Laying the Ghost. Furthermore, the Committee are proposing a modest increase in membership fees for 2023 to Family £40 and Individual £25. No increase is proposed for Student membership, nor to the Youth Theatre term fees. As you can see from the accounts, the Youth Theatre makes a significant contribution to the overheads and fixed costs of the Society (£1,460 last year) and we anticipate that this will improve this year as the Youth Theatre has fully reverted to the pre-Covid set up of two groups, Senior and Junior, rather than the three which operated during the restrictions.
As of 28th February 2023, the Society had reserves of £39,003, an increase of £341. These reserves are held on deposit with Santander bank.
Clive Dow asked about the comparison in membership for this year compared to last year and it is still the same – no growth.
Linda Daman mentioned for expenditure this year, should the heaters in the Green Room be fixed by the trustees. It’s not clear who’s responsibility it is. The Committee need to take it up with the trustees and maybe negotiate a part payment with them.
Wargrave Youth Theatre (Chez Annetts)
We are very lucky to have Chez Annetts back and running the Wargrave Youth Theatre. There are now two groups instead of three, each with 15 members. The intermediate and seniors are now combined and both groups continue to be very successful.
As part of the festival 2022, WYT performed an interpretation of ‘As You Like It’ directed by Chez, on the Mill Green Open-Air stage on Friday, 10th and Saturday, 11th June which was a huge success, if not challenging at times. The children were also involved in this year’s pantomime, ‘The Pied Piper’ which they loved and are now as keen as ever to get back on the stage.
Chez is currently working on their stagecraft in the weekly sessions and they are all very enthusiastic about coming up with their own ideas, in a similar style to ‘The Play that Goes Wrong’ for the November 2023 production.
Chez needs a production crew, same as an adult production would have so if you can help in any way, please do get in touch at wargrave.theatre@gmail.com.
Report by the Committee
A Committee report was provided as there had been no Chairperson in post during the year.
Below is the full version of the report presented by Henry Marchant:
“Introduction
We present this Committee report to you in the continuing absence of a Chairperson at our helm. We were not successful in attracting any volunteers for the rôle either at last year’s AGM or in the ensuing months. But perhaps things will change when we hold the Election of Officers later this evening…
Your current Committee of Ann, Joy, Michael, Emma Jane, Dave, Sara, myself (Henry), and Patricia (who kindly stepped forward last May to fill the vacancy left by Madeleine), have worked collaboratively, harmoniously and hard to keep WTW on the road and afloat, if you will allow the mix of metaphors.
With Covid restrictions largely fading into history – though with the virus itself still very poignantly in our midst – we entered the year with a renewed optimism that we could do our best to maintain a good output of shows, manage our finances and our eclectic range of assets responsibly, and begin to promote our image more widely to attract new members and ideas, so as to keep the society active and solvent.
The Productions We Put On
It being a Wargrave Festival year (delayed from 2021 due to Covid restrictions), our first major show – continuing our long-established Festival tradition – was Shakespeare’s The Tempest, directed by Joe Haynes and Peter Hughes, which took place on Mill Green from the 8th to the 11th of June. An early decision had to be made about repositioning the auditorium on the Green, due to our normal space in front of the Church being used for an enormous lunch party to celebrate the late Queen’s 70th Jubilee!
Our choice of site towards the back of the Green, where we had held A Seat in the Park in September 2020, appeared to be a good one, with many people feeling that it had greater intimacy and fewer distractions than the usual location, though we did have to sacrifice a number of seats to fit in the space between the trees.
Though ticket sales were initially slow (usual worries about the weather, perhaps?), these nevertheless picked up and the fantastic cast, with ages ranging from 17 to 90 years, played to creditably full and undeniably enthusiastic audiences every night. And the weather did not let us down this time either!
Using the same stage, our Youth Theatre members also put on a superb interpretation of As You Like It, but I’ll let Chez tell you all about that when she gives the Youth Theatre report later.
With much uncertainty about whether the Woodclyffe Hall could even be used before Christmas, due to ongoing investigations about the safety of its roof, our proposed Autumn production of Laying the Ghost by Simon Williams, directed by Ann Roberts, had to be postponed until the Spring, and this was eventually performed to packed houses in late April this year. We’ll crow some more about this production in next year’s AGM report, but suffice it to say for now that after some anxious moments right up to the last rehearsal, the actors pulled out all the stops and delivered a most entertaining show, again to largely full houses. What’s more we were thrilled to have in the audience on Friday the much-renowned author himself, who met the actors and crew afterwards for a “photo-opp” and was highly complimentary on the standard of acting and production. AND he sent us an email afterwards with fulsome praise for the evening he and his granddaughter had enjoyed!
To try to fill the gap left by the delayed Ghost, we were eventually able to present two short plays with small casts and minimal scenery – Last Tango in Little Grimley by David Tristram, and Hey, Santa! Remember Me? by Trevor Suthers, directed by Joy Haynes – at the now-available Woodclyffe Hall from the 8th to the 10th of December. These hilarious performances proved a huge success, despite clashes with the World Cup and the freezing weather conditions at the time, and the lure of complimentary mulled wine and mince pies was irresistible.
Last Tango was also subsequently performed to the Twyford and Ruscombe History Society and again at the Henley Drama Festival a fortnight ago. And, as you may already know, our brilliant team took away the prizes not only for Best Play, but also for Best Actress (Grace Tye), Best Actor (Mike Watt), and Most Magical Moment (Sara Beazley). This is a great achievement and will be the envy of other drama groups for miles around, at least for the next twelve months anyway!
Nothing, however, was set to stand in the way of our annual pantomime, which this year was The Pied Piper by Alan P Frayn, directed by the indefatigible Linda Daman, and was performed to seven full houses between the 25th and 29th of January. Excellent casting, including three teams of children from our Youth Theatre for the first time in many years, the introduction of our talented new Musical Director, Louisa Briguglio, and the A-Team behind the scenes ensured this was, as ever, a resounding success.
Considerable thanks should go to everyone involved in all of these shows for the amazing effort they put in, whether they were on the stage or supporting in the many off-stage roles (or both!). Our backdrop here is showing a selection of stills from the shows, and don’t forget that you can see reviews and photographs of our recent productions on our website at www.wargravetheatre.co.uk.
Key Issues We Dealt With
On the premises that we rent, it has taken over a year to finalise with the Parish Council our backstage and dressing room lease for the Woodclyffe Hall, which came up for renewal at the end of March last year. However, thanks to the tireless efforts of Ann Roberts, a good deal has been struck which continues to give us discounted hire of the Hall for productions and clarifies the responsibilities which fall to the landlord or to us. Incidentally, the option for us to take over the lease of the whole Hall is still on the table, but we await the next move from the Council to take this forward.
Temporary steel guards to prevent tiles falling from the Hall roof have been installed, but work to replace the roof fully is scheduled to be carried out during August, after inspections to establish the presence (or absence) of bats and the condition of the roof have been carried out, and Listed Building regulations on the use of suitable new materials are satisfied. We very much hope that the Hall will be ready in good time for our Autumn production.
As part of the safety works, we were asked to vacate the loft space in the Hall, where we had, with permission, been storing lighting and audio equipment for nearly 50 years. Alternative storage has been found, and several surplus and vintage items have been disposed of appropriately.
We have finished installing ourselves in our new scenery storage facility, known affectionately as the Old Tractor Shed, at Highfield Farm. We feel much more secure and comfortable there, but, as Michael our Treasurer will mention later, we have also had to factor in quite high business rates on these modest premises. However, even with this extra cost, the economic argument for leaving Sheeplands still holds good.
Turning next to publicity, a small sub-group of the Committee, led by me, considered what actions we could take to modernise our image and to increase its appeal to a wider and younger range of potential new members. This is an ongoing task that should be kept under review, but the Committee’s initial conclusions were: that we should first update the operating name of the society to Wargrave Theatre; this should be followed by a redesign of our WTW “cloakroom ticket” logo to reflect the new name; we should then revisit our website to make it more user friendly and easier to refresh with new information, as well as brightening up and standardising our branding across all our media platforms. Please note that this meeting will be asked to approve this change later in the agenda this evening, so that the next stages of this strategy can proceed. We are always eager to hear from members or associates of the society who could offer some time and expertise to help us develop these ideas further.
A positive innovation, which you may already have noticed, is that we shall normally be including paid advertising from local firms in our show programmes. This will help pay for their printing, particularly with shows like the pantomime, where we now propose to put a free programme on each seat for each performance, to avoid running out as we did this year. Many thanks to Patricia for putting this into effect.
Membership News
It was with great sadness that we learned of the deaths of Elaine Fear last May and of Maureen Fennemore in January. All of Elaine’s family, especially Alan, was heavily involved in our productions over a long period, but Elaine will be remembered by us in particular for the exquisite artwork she brought to some of the pantomime backdrops.
Maureen was a member for nearly 40 years, first founding the Junior Theatre Workshop with Chris Bennett, then, with her dear friend Judi Rowlands, going on to mastermind the costumes for almost every adult production thereafter, often creating pieces from scratch with incredible authenticity. As if that wasn’t enough to do, she and Judi also ran the Wardrobe Hire Service for many years, providing local people with stunning or even outrageous party outfits, and the Workshop with some welcome extra income.
We thank them both most sincerely for their contributions and wish their families well.
In February, nearly 30 members, partners and guests went to watch the Mill at Sonning’s very impressive and entertaining production of We’ll Always Have Paris by Jill Hyem, directed by Sally Hughes. Preceded by an excellent dinner, our evening was topped off by the opportunity to mingle with the starlit cast in the bar after the show! You will recall that Ann Roberts produced our very successful version of the comedy in April 2019. We are most grateful to Ann and Len – as Mill Angels – for securing such a generous discount on the ticket price and for organising a really enjoyable evening.
What’s Next?
The new Committee will want at an early stage to consolidate a programme of shows running into next year, but as always this will depend on the willingness of members to come forward with ideas and an eagerness to direct and bring them into production. As was noted starkly by our Chairman at the last AGM, we are becoming increasingly reliant on the same core of people, some of them Members since the early days of WTW, to maintain our output, both on and off the stage, so a year on we once again put out a plea for new talent to join our award-winning team, build on our recent successes, and help secure our future.
As you heard from our Treasurer’s report, the society is only just keeping its financial head above water, so a full programme of shows will be essential to ensure that we do not slip under the waves. We are scheduling an Autumn production for October, a Youth Theatre production in November, our annual pantomime in January 2024, and a Spring production, followed by the next Festival Shakespeare outdoors in June. Details of all these shows are to be finalised by the new Committee at a special future productions meeting at the end of this month, and we will consider offers from anyone willing to step up to put on one of these shows. So please let us know if you are interested.
To conclude our report, the Committee would like to record its sincere thanks to everyone who has involved themselves in and supported our shows in the past year, whether being in them, helping to put them on, or coming to watch them. Thank you.”
Election of Officers
Chairman: Ann Roberts Proposed by Joy Haynes, Seconded by Dave Robinson
Treasurer: (Michael Jamieson) Proposed by Ann Roberts, Seconded by Joy Haynes
Secretary (Emmajane Hughes) Proposed by Ann Pearce, Seconded by Celia Reinbolt
Committee standing:
(Chez Annetts) Proposed by Ann Roberts, Seconded by Sara Beazley
(Clive Dow) Proposed by Jenny Manning, Seconded by Hilda Freeman
(Patricia Frost) Proposed by Emmajane Hughes, Seconded by Sara Beazley
(Joy Haynes) Proposed by Len Roberts, Seconded by Sara Beazley
(Dave Robinson) Proposed by Linda Daman, Seconded by Celia Reinbolt
Committee 2023/2024 – Sara Beazley, Henry Marchant
Approval of Changes to the Constitution
We need to provide indemnity to any committee (or other) member who sign contracts or agreements on behalf of the society.
It was agreed the constitution needs to be updated.
Approval of Increase of Membership
All were in favour of a £5 increase for adults and family membership.
No change for students and youth group.
Approval of Name Change
Henry set up a sub-committee earlier this year with Ffion and Chez who came up with a list of new names for the group. The committee agreed “Wargrave Theatre” would be our operating name going forward. Legally ‘WTW’ will still operate behind the scenes. AGM approved this name change and the committee will now plan next steps to look at a new logo and branding.
AOB
Rod Murray advised we should revise the whole constitution to bring it up to date. He offered to help with this exercise.
Martin Lorenz suggested putting on an old time musical as it gives multiple potential directors a chance to direct a small scale piece.
It was agreed that the committee would look at organising a membership evening during the summer.
Joy Haynes suggested a weekly rota to sort out the wardrobe is required. She will organise a weekly session with anyone who can spare a couple of hours.